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The Coulee Region Group offers a free monthly educational
program after a brief member & guest meeting. They are
held on the last Tuesday of the non summer months at 7:00pm. Our meetings consist of a brief update on current
conservation issues both local and national, then a program
featuring a speaker or a club member presentation.
Welcome back, hope you are having a
great summer!
Autumn is coming and our group meetings are starting up
this month.
General Meeting:
Tuesday, Nov. 24, 7:00 PM
MyRick Hixon EcoPark, La Crosse, WI
Program: Complete Streets
Speaker: Charley Weeth – President, Livable
Neighborhoods
Complete Streets provide safe and accessible infrastructure
for all transit choices, including cars, trucks, buses,
bicycles, and pedestrians. It’s about improving the quality of
life for all residents of a community, as well as reducing our
carbon footprint, reducing land used for roads and for
parking, and improving individual health. Charley Weeth is the
president of Livalble Neighborhoods
– a La Crosse organization founded in the 1990’s to advocate
for improving quality of life and enlightened transportation
planning in our community. Charley is also a member of
Wisconsin Walks.
General
Meeting at
New MyRick Location
Tuesday, Oct. 27, 7:00 PM at
Myrick Hixon Ecopark
Sierra
Club members and non-members all welcome
(6 PM: Executive Committee meeting)
Topic: Community Supported Forest
Speaker: Amelia Baxter, Manager - Driftless Farm and Forest
It started with word play and an understanding that a
sustainable forest is more than just its trees. Community
Supported Forest (CSF) is a model of membership in a natural
resource, much like a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture).
In a CSF, members reap the abundance of a sustainably managed
forest.
This year, Driftless Farm and Forest planted this seed of
an idea and is growing what it thinks is the first Community
Supported Forest on its 134 acres in Stoddard, WI. This
project facilitates a sustainable relationship between its
members and a rural forest resource often overlooked. Amelia
Baxter, Driftless Farm's manager, will talk about this
innovative venture, share Driftless Farm's history of unique
forest management, and why we all need to consider the
importance of local forests in our global management of CO2.
ANNUAL 2009 Autumn Assembly!!
near Eau Claire this year, Weekend of Oct 9-11
Plan
to attend the John Muir
Chapter’s 2009 Autumn Assembly hosted by the Chippewa Valley
and St.
Croix Valley Interstate Groups on October 9 – 11 at Beaver
Creek Reserve near Eau Claire.
The Autumn
Assembly is an educational and enjoyable weekend gathering
featuring workshops, speakers and hands-on nature activities
for kids of all ages! The diverse activities will inform and
inspire you as you enjoy the company of Sierra Club members
and friends from across Wisconsin.
For more details
or answers to your questions, please contact Barb Thomas,
Chippewa Valley Group Chair (715-235-9771 or thomash@uwstout.edu)
or Carol Hardin, St.
Croix Valley Group Chair (cchardin8@gmail.com). You can
download a registration form and read more at:
http://wisconsin.sierraclub.org/Events/aa.asp
First General
Meeting and
NEW LOCATION
Tuesday, Sept. 29
7:00 PM
at the Myrick Hixon Ecopark (In Myrick Park)
Sierra
Club members and non-members all welcome
(6 PM: Executive Committee meeting)
Urban Sprawl in the La Crosse
Region
Speaker: Cynthia Berlin,
Associate
Professor,
Geography & Earth
Science, UW-La Crosse
Urban sprawl is a serious problem throughout the United
States
and has been a major focus of the Sierra Club. While most
concern has been with large, metropolitan areas, where
urbanization of natural and farm land is increasing at an
alarming rate, rapid sprawl is a serious problem for many
smaller cities and their surrounding rural communities,
including the greater La Crosse, Wisconsin region. Cynthia
Berlin
of UW-L has done a study of sprawl in the La Crosse area,
using data obtained from 30 years of satellite images.
Satellite
images show that the amount of urban area increased by over
200% from 1984 to 2000, while the population, estimated from
U.S.
Census Bureau
data, increased by only 18.2% for approximately the same time
period. The
satellite images also show the spatial pattern of development
characteristic of sprawl - including scattered and single-use
development, poor accessibility, high edge contrast, and lack
of functional space. During the past 9 years, sprawl has
continued throughout the greater La Crosse region and shows no
sign of abating even during this most recent recession.
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Our
local group meetings are posted in our newsletter and held in
downtown La Crosse, WI.
